The Theory of Environment An Outline of the History of the Idea of Milieu, and Its Present Status, part 1

Before entering upon the discussion of the principal theme of this study,[1] it is necessary to cast a brief glance over the origin and development of the meaning and use of the word milieu.

“Milieu” (mi-lieu=medius locus), originally signifying middle point or part, central place or portion, mid-point, center, had been employed in France as a term in physics at least as early as the seventeenth century (Pascal). The fourth edition of the dictionary of the French Academy[2] defines it as follows: “En termes de Physique, on appelle Milieu, Tout corps, soit solide, soit fluide, traversé par la lumière ou par un autre corps.” [In the fifth edition—1813—the following illustration in italics is added to the foregoing: “La lumière se rompt différemment en traversant différens milieux.”]

“On appelle aussi milieu, Le fluide qui environne les corps. _L’air est le milieu dans lequel nous vivons. L’eau est le milieu qu’habitent les poissons._”

Diderot’s Encyclopedia[3] testifies to this same sense of “medium”: “_Milieu_, dans la Philosophie mêchanique, signifie un espace matériel à travers lequel passe un corps dans son mouvement, ou en général, un espace matériel dans lequel un corps est placé, soit qu’il se meuve ou non.

“Ainsi on imagine l’éther comme un milieu dans lequel les corps célestes se meuvent.—L’air est un milieu dans lequel les corps se meuvent près de la surface de la terre.—L’eau est le milieu dans lequel les poissons vivent & se meuvent.—Le verre enfin est un milieu, en égard à la lumière, parce qu’il lui permet un passage à travers ses pores.”

Auguste Comte[4] extended its signification as a term in biology to include “the totality of external conditions of any kind whatsoever”: “_Milieu_ ..., non-seulement le fluide où l’organisme est plongé, mais, en général, l’ensemble total des circonstances extérieurs d’un genre quelconque [the italics are ours], nécessaires à l’existence de chaque organisme déterminé. Ceux qui auront suffisamment médité sur le rôle capital que doit remplir, dans toute biologie positive, l’idée correspondante, ne me reprocheront pas, sans doute, l’introduction de cette expression nouvelle.”

Hippolyte Taine who generalized it still further, broadened its connotation to comprehend the whole social surroundings.[5] Milieu as a terminus technicus is ordinarily considered as having been coined by Taine, but whether that be so or not, one may safely say that its wide acceptance is due, primarily, to him and to his renowned disciple Zola.[6]

In the course of the last century, the designation milieu became not only more generalized and more frequent in use, but also more extensive, and more specific and distinctive in meaning: “Depuis BALZAC [who in 1841 in his Comédie humaine, La maison du chat-qui-pelote, préface, p. 2, used the term loosely, in the “vulgar” sense], le sens vulgaire du milieu social n’a fait que s’affirmer davantage par un emploi toujours plus généralisé: c’est devenu un cliché de la conversation de parler aujourd’hui d’un ‘bon milieu,’ d’un ‘milieu intéressant,’ etc.”[7]

Littré[8] registers eighteen different definitions for the word milieu.

Friedrich Düsel[9] renders milieu by eighteen (18) German words.

In Unsere Umgangssprache,[10] milieu is translated into German by forty-six (46) words and phrases.

Claude Bernard, the celebrated French physiologist, differentiates between inner and outer milieu:[11] “Je crois ..., avoir le premier insisté sur cette idée qu’il y a pour l’animal réellement deux milieux: un milieu extérieur dans lequel est placé l’organisme et un milieu intérieur dans lequel vivent les éléments des tissus....” Probably as a result, we have today “micro-milieu” in micro-biology.

According to Jean Finot,[12] milieu “includes the sum total of the conditions which accompany the conception and earthly existence of a being, and which end only with its death.”

The term milieu was introduced by Herbert Spencer into English literature as “environment,” says Martin Schütze.[13] Although Carlyle employed the term “environment” as early as 1827,[14] nevertheless, the fact that the term is generally current, is undoubtedly attributable in the first place to Spencer.

The word “Umwelt” is quoted by J. H. Campe,[15] who believed himself to have been the coiner of the term; five years later (1816) Goethe used it at the beginning of his “Italienische Reise.”[16]

The painstaking and scholarly German lexicographer, Daniel Sanders, who seldom fails to give his reader some reliable suggestion, refers in his _Wörterbuch der Deutschen Sprache_[17] (which despite the contributions of recent scholarship still remains a great work) to a passage in the poetical works of the Danish writer Baggesen (2, 102) in which the word “Umwelt” is employed. This passage occurs in the elegy entitled “Napoleon” addressed to Voß and written in 1800.[18] Baggesen, then, made use of “Umwelt” a decade before Campe.

Its Italian equivalent is “ambiente,” which is noted here only because of the French “l’ambiance” and the English “ambient” and “circumambiency.”